The Flopping of Charli XCX’s "How I’m Feeling Now" Is an International Scandal

We will all stand in judgement for this.

How did you spend quarantine? Writing and recording a mind-bending 11-track pop album (months after dropping your last record) and filming several music videos using only equipment on hand?

Oh, you didn’t? Huh. 'cos Charli XCX did.

Charli—the songwriting phenom who has changed the face of music with such ease and regularity that she once had no choice but to release a mixtape called Pop 2—dropped How I’m Feeling Now on 15 May, following six weeks of intensive production in isolation. She documented the making-of over social media and shared the sparkling and eternal single "Forever" within the first three days. With its earnest yearning, unlikely yet much-needed poptimism and its frantic, shattered collage of 'love in the time of COVID' music video, "Forever" may be one of the defining cultural contributions from this very strange period in our existence.

Of course, she’s not the only artist to have made music and videos during the coronavirus pandemic. Still, only Charli whipped up a whole album’s worth with such short lead time, and certainly no one else made anything as good.

Just one problem: the album flopped, debuting at #33 on the UK Album Chart, #37 on the ARIA Chart and a devastating #111 on the US Billboard Chart.

We hate to use the word 'flop' when referring to a Charli XCX album, because that presumes she should be competing with the likes of more conventional mainstream artists, despite being a futurist who’s vibrating on a different frequency to everyone else in the game.

But it’s painful because Charli’s had hits before. She’s scored multiple #1 singles, having co-written and featured on Iggy Azalea’s "Fancy" and Icona Pop’s "I Love It". Her solo track "Boom Clap" was a bona fide smash. She also co-wrote Camilla Cabello’s "Señorita" and has penned tunes for other, more commercially palatable artists, like Selena Gomez and Gwen Stefani.

However, her albums have always struggled. Trailblazing debut True Romance peaked at #85 in the UK, while follow-up Sucker only managed #28 in the US, despite rising to #15 in the UK. Her 2019 effort Charli got all the way to #7 in Australia and #14 in the UK, but merely #42 in the States, even though it boasted the irresistible "Gone".

How I’m Feeling Now marks her lowest chart premiere (excluding her mixtapes and EPs).

Was there not enough pre-release hype? Maybe. Not enough tour support? Clearly (there’s no such thing as live touring at the moment, after all). Are people even listening to music right now? Well, yes, in droves (because Future just hit #1 for the seventh time in the US with his biggest week as a solo artist, though it helped he had a hit in "Life Is Good" that’s been around since January).

Any way you justify it, or don’t, Charli deserved better. How I’m Feeling Now scored an 82 on Metacritic, with a user score of 8.9, even beating the marks of her acclaimed Charli (80 and 8.6). Plainly, we, as a society, have let her down.

charli xcx when she came to save the music industry and yall let her flop pic.twitter.com/ZnTORg5L7v

— ً🇫🇷 (@swjftnow) May 27, 2020

The good news is she probably won’t think twice about it, and is likely already onto the next thing. Over the last two years, she wrapped up a support gig on Taylor Swift’s Reputation tour with the roll-out of Charli and the promotion of her very own Netflix reality show, I’m With the Band, all about her Svengali-like role in the lives of rockers Nasty Cherry. How I’m Feeling Now—despite featuring her most unvarnished and vulnerable lyrics in years (especially regarding her long-term, on-off relationship with boyfriend Huck Kwong) and typically glittering beats—is basically Charli at her most flippant. This is what she pulled off when she was barely trying. When Charli returns with her next album, and spends more than six weeks on it, we will not be prepared.

How I'm Feeling Now is now available, obviously.

Header Image: Atlantic / A24